The Hand That Holds The Fire

Chapter 18

Chapter 18

“Still can’t?” I asked sadly, though the answer was right in front of me, mocking me. Linus hadn’t even needed to place those shackles over me. Even free, even with full use of my limbs, I couldn’t bust myself out of my own cell. The cell gates were sealed shut with mage magic that none of us could touch. Linus must have had a poor mage hex this cell before he died. I shuddered with the image of Ren’s head tilted to the side as Linus snacked on his neck.

How useless I am.

Am I really destined to be the damsel in distress, the princess that would always need protection from an escort, more specifically Kain?

“No, Mistress. No vampire or demon can break a magician’s shield. Not even I.” Val said, though he was still trying, hitting his large fist on the gate, but doing not even a single scratch.

“It’s okay, Val. You can stop trying.” I said tiredly, but my demon didn’t stop.

“I won’t stop trying until I can get us out of here, Mistress. We made a blood promise.” Val raised his arms over his head again, and while the room shook with the impact of Val’s fist against the gate, it did nothing.

“We did?”

“When you first called me, Mistress. You made me your demon familiar with a blood promise. I would protect you until your death, and you would release me away from Hell occasionally.”

“I must have forgotten it.” Not that it had mattered. My mind was still in fragments, my thoughts skittering all over the place. Most of those thoughts centered on how I missed Kain, and how he’d hurt me again.

I understood now. Why he refused to tell me why Mila and Gabriel and Ren were all so loyal to him. Why they called him ‘Master’. Why he never told me about Linus –because he was afraid he would reveal more to me than he dared. I understood why he didn’t tell me when I first woke up, but did he truly mean to hide everything from me? What was his goal?

I don’t doubt Kain’s love, but I doubt my heart. If I didn’t love Kain, then I wouldn’t hurt so much from the sting of betrayal. But I still had Lorcan.

I wrapped my knees into my own embrace and closed my eyes. The mess of Lorcan and Kain, Lucifer and Dragos was like a ball of thread –tangled and messed up. The different colors of the threads intertwined, changing colors, and I couldn’t decipher where the end or the start was. All I knew was that I couldn’t untangle it easily, no matter which angle I tried to approach it from. In the core of that tangled ball of mess… was my heart.

“Mistress, you’re hurting. But it is not from physical pain.” Val observed, and I opened my eyes to see my demon familiar finally giving up on the gate, turning his attention to me.

Yes, Captain Obvious. My mind thought viciously, but I kept those words away from my lips. Val is my only companion in this lonely cell. If I were to piss him off… then I would have no one left in my life. If I even have a life anymore.

“It is nothing you can help with, Val. But thank you for your concern, all the same.” I sighed, looking down at the pool of blood that belonged to Kain. Oh, how he had suffered, just to take care of me.

Kain. He really was a fool. Why he did not run away from Lucifer was beyond me. He was a royal of Dragos. He could have the riches of the world. He could order vampires around, and, as the second son, he would have freedom more than the crown prince. Kain could do everything he liked, have everything go according to his will, and never be ordered around.

Instead, he’d given up all that to be a guard, then a fighter. He could have run away from the Pit anytime when he was training under his master. He could have gone back to Dragos and order for the Pit to be destroyed. Kain could have just lost his life in the Pit, and Dagon  Dragos wouldn’t even know. His mother wouldn’t even know.